TravelMole Interview: Christine Wilson, Norfolk Convention & Visitors Bureau

Once known almost entirely as the world’s largest naval station, the city of Norfolk, Virginia, is seeing a visitor boom, says Christine Wilson, communications manager for the local CVB. “Our visitor numbers are up 5.1% compared to last year,” she told TravelMole. Increasingly, she said, travel agents and tour operators are booking the destination “as more and more people are finding out about us.” “In the last couple of years, we’ve developed a downtown with a waterfront setting. We’ve added new restaurants, a new upscale shopping mall, and we even have the battleship Wisconsin for visitors to see,” she said. Cruise operators are increasingly making Norfolk a stop. The area had 140,000 passengers pass through the city last year. Radisson Seven Seas and Carnival use the port, and the latest to dock here has been Holland America. The local port is also boosted by its existence as NATO’s second office (the other is in Belgium). The base here, which has 85,000 people, is still a tourist stop but new attractions are increasingly popular, according to Ms Wilson. These include a National Maritime Center, the Chrysler Museum of Art, the Norfolk Botanical Gardens, and various year-round arts and cultural festivals. Ms Wilson said a popular tool for agents and others is a Passport to Fun discount book available through the CVB. Report by David Wilkening